Blog

By Ellen Shubart, Class 0f 2006

She calls working at Chicago Architecture Center “a dream job,” as it links her professional skills with her personal interests. Lauren Bakos, CAC’s new Director of Marketing, has been on the job only for a few months, and yet she has thrown herself into some of the more interesting projects of recent times – marketing for the February film festival and the upcoming Timber exhibit, as well as for the ongoing activities. 

“She was my first interview” for the job, says Vice-President of Marketing Lisa Nucci. “I knew immediately she was the perfect fit.” 

Bakos, a Southerner by birth, doesn’t care much for southern weather – “I hate humidity,” she says. “I’ll take a Chicago winter over a southern summer any day. I have curly hair,” which partially explains her aversion to excessive humidity. Yet she grew up in Pensacola, Florida and attended Loyola University of New Orleans. Her parents met in architecture school, although only her dad practices today. Her mom has become a CPA. Dad designed the family’s mid-century modern home and gave each of his three children the option to design their own rooms. Lauren selected a room with a “reading window,” an oriel window resembling something she’d seen at a local library. Her brothers designed their own rooms as well, one with a ladder for a potential fireman and the other a secret room, entered through a hidden door at the back of his closet. 

After working for a time in the south, Bakos decided she couldn’t grow in her work there and “needed a change of scenery.” She systematically spent two to three weeks in each of seven cities for possible relocation. The first six were Los Angeles, Seattle, New York, Washington, D.C., Del Ray Beach, FL, and Chicago. After the Chicago visit, she cancelled a stay in Austin, TX. She’d made up her mind. She’d fallen in love with Chicago, partially because she took the river cruise. “It was autumn, September,” she said. “I loved it.” And, she’s been here for a while, getting married and starting a family. Bakos lives with her husband Chris and two children — two-year-old Cecilia and four-year-old Griffin – in Uptown. 

When asked about her favorite building, Bakos chose the Chicago Cultural Center. “The details are so beautiful.” Any architecture she is not fond of? “I like Brutalist art, but I’m not so sure about Brutalist architecture,” she admits. 

Bakos sees her job as implementation — promoting what is coming, and doing so on time and on budget. Her previous work was, as she put it, “pitching salons, spas, shampoo, and lip gloss.” She worked at a marketing agency whose primary client was Aveda, a beauty care company. Today she is looking to promote tours, exhibits, and programs. Bakos said implementing work practices that CAC’s new PCEO Eleanor Gorski is pursuing – collaboration, moving away from silo-ism and toward inter-departmental cooperation – should produce new synergy for the organization and better marketing for all programs. 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

CLICK HERE for more stories on The Bridge.